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Travel from Dubai on a Budget With Next Holidays

Travel from Dubai on a Budget With Next Holidays

Next Holidays is a leading travel agency in Dubai. It is popular for its loyalty and dedication to offering unique travel experiences. So, it offers an outstanding chance to explore charming destinations on a budget. It is a UAE-based online destination management company.

These veterans served our country, now they say the VA is taking away their doctors

These veterans served our country, now they say the VA is taking away their doctors

This story discusses suicide. If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide, please contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or 1-800-273-TALK (8255). FIRST ON FOX: Michael Cohen, a veteran of the U.S. Air Force, has not slept in a week. At night, the 54-year-old former law enforcement specialist is tortured by “horrendous memories” from his 22 year-long career in the Air Force, serving both on active duty and in the reserves. Cohen estimates he’s been deployed to 85 countries in that time, including areas where he was not allowed to wear his uniform “because of the terrorist threat.”  “A number of traumatic events happened,” Cohen told Fox News Digital in an interview. He described having symptoms that have hurt his relationships, including “nightmares, the attitude, withdrawal.”  “The wife is completely freaking out because as I’m getting older, something is going on. I cannot repress, push down all of this to where my triggers are horrendous, and I actually have to do something with my civilian employment, because the people I interact with are triggering me, and I don’t even realize that,” Cohen said. MOBILE MEDICAL CLINICS BRING HEALTH CARE DIRECTLY TO HOMELESS VETERANS IN 25 CITIES Some years ago, his wife begged him to get help from the local Veterans Affairs medical facility in West Palm Beach, Florida. Cohen said he tried, but after many years and multiple VA therapists who could not see him on a regular basis, he decided to pay out-of-pocket for private care. He would like the VA to pay for his therapy through community care — a program designed for eligible veterans to receive care from a community provider when the VA cannot provide the care needed.  Cohen is one of several veterans who spoke to Fox News Digital about how the West Palm Beach VA Healthcare System is no longer approving their requests for community care, cutting them off from their longtime mental health providers, with potentially devastating results. Jessica Carillo, a former Air Force staff sergeant, receives primary care through the West Palm Beach VA.  “I got laid off last year in September, and I have not been able to pay for my psychiatrist that I used to pay out of pocket,” she told Fox News Digital. She said community care helped pay for her therapy, but the VA cut her off in January.  “I was in the middle of a big, big, big session. We just discovered some major things. And then, they left me in limbo,” Carillo said.  MEMORIAL DAY: IMPORTANT FACTS ABOUT THE SOLEMN AMERICAN HOLIDAY Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., a former Army bomb technician who lost both his legs and a finger in Afghanistan, represents the Palm Beach area in Florida’s 21st Congressional District. He said his office has been contacted by over 70 veterans, relatives and mental health providers who have complained that the VA will no longer refer patients to community care.  “They are now being told, listen, everybody that you were seeing outside for your mental health care, you can’t do that anymore. You now have to come internal to the West Palm Beach VA hospital and get your mental health care there,” Mast said.  Community care has existed in a limited form since the early 1920s and was made permanent when President Trump signed the VA Mission Act in 2018. “Initially, people were always required to get their care inside of the VA. The VA started having really long wait times, or wasn’t providing adequate service, or a number of reasons why people decided they wanted to get outside of the VA. And the Trump administration said, great, you want to go get community care, we’re going to create a system for you to go outside of the VA,” Mast explained.  READ REP. BRIAN MAST’S LETTER TO THE VA BELOW – APP USERS, CLICK HERE: “Now the Biden administration is saying, we don’t want to allow that to happen,” he said. Mast sent a letter to VA Secretary Denis McDonough last week demanding an explanation for this apparent “departure from long-standing practices.”  Mast warned that interruptions to veterans’ care, especially mental health treatments, can have tragic consequences.  “When you talk about some of the issues that are created, when you’re switched from doctor to doctor to doctor, there are frustrations that exist, and we all handle frustrations differently. And sometimes those frustrations create serious moments of crisis in your life,” Mast said. “It’s really difficult to build a rapport with a provider, a doctor, a therapist, and then to be stripped away of the care that you’re used to getting,” said Ingrid Hernandez, an Iraq war veteran who runs a PTSD support group in Mast’s district. Her community care referral was canceled in March.  The Department of Veterans Affairs denies there’s been any change in its policy or budget cuts for community care. The Biden administration’s 2025 budget estimates that the Veterans Health Administration will obligate a total of $139.5 billion in 2024. Of this total, community care is expected to comprise $36.5 billion, officials said, a record high.  Veterans who qualify are still eligible to get community care referrals, but what has happened is that fewer veterans can qualify for the program because the VA has expanded facilities and hired more doctors in Florida, according to officials.  MILITARY VETERAN EMBRACES ‘NEW SERVICE’ OF HELPING OTHERS AFTER HIS PARKINSON’S DIAGNOSIS: ‘THERE IS HOPE’ “There is no change to VA’s community care program — in Florida or nationally — and VA continues to ensure that Veterans can access world-class care whenever and wherever they need it, whether that’s in the community or in the direct VA care system,” VA press secretary Terrence Hayes told Fox News Digital.  Hayes said that in the past six years, the VA has delivered “all-time record numbers of community care appointments” to veterans, including 46 million appointments in 2023. “We are on pace to break that record again this year,” he added.  While some veterans

Libertarians select Chase Oliver as presidential nominee, very little support shown for Trump, RFK Jr

Libertarians select Chase Oliver as presidential nominee, very little support shown for Trump, RFK Jr

The Libertarian Party nominated political activist Chase Oliver as its nominee for president at its convention Sunday, rejecting former President Donald Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s longshot bids for the party’s nomination. Oliver secured the nomination in the seventh round of voting after sitting in second place for the first five rounds. He received nearly 60% of the vote in the final round, finally clearing the 50% threshold required for victory, with his final opponent being the “none of the above” option. The last candidate to challenge Oliver was professor-turned-podcaster Michael Rectenwald, who was eliminated in the sixth round after leading in each of the first five rounds. Oliver overcame Rectenwald in the final two rounds after candidate Mike ter Maat was eliminated in the fifth round and endorsed Oliver in exchange for being named his vice presidential choice. “I will continue to bring a hopeful and positive message of liberty to both those who consider themselves libertarian and those who don’t know they are libertarian yet,” Oliver said in his victory speech. TRUMP, IN HOSTILE TERRITORY, FACES BOOING DURING LIBERTARIAN PARTY CONVENTION AS MEMBERS PICK THEIR NOMINEE According to the party’s platform, libertarians value small government and individual freedoms. They tend to oppose war and funding other nations’ wars, the War on Drugs, the death penalty, spying on Americans, taxes, running up the federal deficit and pandemic lockdowns while supporting gun rights, LGBTQ+ rights, freedom of expression and other freedoms that do not infringe on the rights of others. Trump, who is the GOP nominee for president, delivered a speech Saturday night at the Libertarian convention in Washington, D.C., where he was repeatedly booed by some members in attendance. The former president did not qualify for the Libertarian nomination, and he received very few write-in votes on Sunday — just six in the first round. Following Trump’s speech at the convention on Saturday, Oliver said: “I don’t like having a war criminal on this stage.” Kennedy, an independent presidential candidate who had sought the Libertarian nomination, received a more welcoming reception when he spoke at the convention on Friday, hitting both Trump and President Biden for their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. He spoke of his support for the Libertarians and said an endorsement could have helped him expedite the process of gaining ballot access in all 50 states. The independent White House hopeful received just 19 votes in the first round of voting at the convention on Sunday. TRUMP VOWS TO COMMUTE PRISON SENTENCE OF SILK ROAD FOUNDER ROSS ULBRICHT Nominee Oliver, an activist from Atlanta, Georgia, is calling for major cuts to the federal budget with the goal of balancing the budget, the end to the death penalty, the closure of all overseas military bases and the ending of military support to Israel and Ukraine amid their respective wars. He has also said he would pardon WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who the Trump administration indicted, as well as NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and anonymous marketplace website Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht. Oliver forced a runoff in the 2022 Georgia Senate election between Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock and former football star, Republican Herschel Walker. He also previously ran for the U.S. House. His victory Sunday night delivered a blow to the Mises Caucus, the right-leaning faction that took control of the Libertarian Party at its convention two years ago. The Mises Caucus, which supported Rectenwald, had orchestrated Trump’s appearance at the convention. The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Kevin McCarthy’s ghost is haunting House GOPs’ next big legislative fight

Kevin McCarthy’s ghost is haunting House GOPs’ next big legislative fight

He has been out of Congress for nearly half a year, but the shadow of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., is still looming large over the House of Representatives as lawmakers get ready for another intense government funding fight. Last year, McCarthy agreed to suspend the U.S. debt limit through January 2025 in exchange for federal spending caps for the next two fiscal years, a deal he struck with President Biden called the Fiscal Responsibility Act. Under its terms, discretionary government funding can only grow by 1% in fiscal year 2025. House appropriators are now wrestling with how to navigate that cap without severely impacting Homeland Security and Defense spending. Fiscal conservatives want negotiators to stick to the statutory cap, which is roughly $1.606 trillion. Defense hawks, meanwhile, are concerned about the effects of a meager increase and worry it could amount to a spending cut on national security when accounting for inflation. “That was a deal that McCarthy made, right? He’s not here anymore. But our hands might still, legally, be tied to it,” one GOP lawmaker told Fox News Digital.  WHY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS DECIDE THEY ‘GOTTA GET OUT OF THIS PLACE’ “I understand what the intent of the FRA was, but… the caps as written prevent us from effectively keeping pace with China. So, whatever is needed between leadership, the Senate and the president to allow us a little more maneuvering space in terms of the allocations between the federal agencies and the 12 bills, I think is necessary.” Republican Study Committee Chairman Kevin Hern, R-Okla., conceded that “sure” the caps constrained negotiators but urged them to work toward it as written. “Honestly, I’m having a difficult time figuring out why it’s so hard for us to establish the numbers. I mean, it was agreed to a two-year cap. You know, $1.606 trillion is the number, but it’s like everybody’s struggling to figure out what it really is,” Hern said. He noted that fiscal year 2024’s government funding level was “a little bit higher” than the agreed-upon $1.59 trillion, thanks to “some sidebar deals that all of us found out about afterwards.” “But this cap is $1.606, and with no backroom cigar smoke-filled room deals. So we’ll see where my colleague Congressman Cole comes up with the appropriations,” Hern said. NATIONAL SECURITY HAWKS WARN CONGRESS THROWING PENTAGON ‘UNDER THE BUS’ WITH ‘INADEQUATE’ SPENDING BUMP When asked about whether he felt constrained by the FRA, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole, R-Okla., told Fox News Digital, “I mean, that’s the law, so we’re going to mark it up to what the law tells us to mark up to.” Rep. Jake Ellzey, R-Texas, a member of the Appropriations Committee, similarly said, “We’re doing the best we can, it’s the law of the land. So you do what you can with what you’ve got — if frogs had wings, they’d be a lot more successful on not hitting their rear end when they jump.” He also suggested that there would be certain hurdles brought by the FRA. “Based on the FRA, most of those bills are going to take a shave except for Defense and Homeland. And of course, even with the increase for those two, it’s a net decrease because of inflation, so real dollars are still getting cut no matter which spending bill you’re talking about,” Ellzey said. “Chairman Cole has already made some good, hard, strategic decisions…so we’ve got some clear pictures of where we’re going, and we’re going to be far more aggressive on getting those bills done on time this year.” Indeed, House GOP leaders are eyeing an ambitious schedule to get all 12 individual spending bills that fund the U.S. government passed well before the Sept. 30 deadline at the end of the fiscal year. SENATE PASSES MAMMOTH $1.2T SPENDING PACKAGE AFTER BRIEF PARTIAL GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., outlined a legislative calendar that would have them passed before Congress embarks on a monthlong August recess during a closed-door House GOP conference meeting earlier this week, a source familiar with his comments told Fox News Digital. Last year’s government funding fight was marked by chaos and disagreements within the House GOP as members on the right of the conference pushed leaders to leverage a government shutdown in exchange for deeper spending cuts, while other Republicans sounded the alarm on the economic and political ramifications a shutdown would have. The fight over funding the government in fiscal year 2024 was among the factors that led to McCarthy’s historic ouster last October. Fox News Digital reached out to a representative for the former speaker for comment.